Arthurian Resources

[diaglo]

marian zimmer bradley's Mists of Avalon and the followups to it.
mary stewart's The Crystal Cave and the others in the series

mark twain... aka... Samuel Langhorne Clemens ... connecticut yankee in king arthur's court

and bullfinch's mythology

 

[GrumpyOldMan]

Get Pendragon RPG, probably the best game ever done in the subject. Even if you ditch the rules, there is a lot you can take for your D&D game.

Personally, I'd keep the rules too, you get some great characters, and the system still stands up after all these years.

GOM

 

[Thotas]

Wombat, if your post was meant to be largely a reply to mine, I'm completely with you. I love the full range of imagery associated with Arthur both by scholars and by romancers. Depending on my mood on a given day, I may prefer Goodrich arguing that Lancelot was a real person, but his name and story are so garbled by the medieval romancers who supposedly "invented" him that we don't recognize him ... or I might watch John Boorman's "Excalibur" or read "The Once and Future King" again. There's a reason this millenium and a half old story still has people digging into it. It's simply one of the best we've ever come up with.

 

[Wombat]

Wombat, if your post was meant to be largely a reply to mine, I'm completely with you. I love the full range of imagery associated with Arthur both by scholars and by romancers. Depending on my mood on a given day, I may prefer Goodrich arguing that Lancelot was a real person, but his name and story are so garbled by the medieval romancers who supposedly "invented" him that we don't recognize him ... or I might watch John Boorman's "Excalibur" or read "The Once and Future King" again. There's a reason this millenium and a half old story still has people digging into it. It's simply one of the best we've ever come up with.

Wasn't replying to you in particular (it was more of a general observation), but I think we are of a similar temperament on this question

While I am not fond of N.L. Goodrich, per se, due to some background that I won't bother to dredge up here, I find looking for historical information on the era in general, and the characters in particular, quite intriguing. Equally, I love the medieval romances, Monty Python & the Holy Grail, and all points in between. What can I say? I have an Arthur on my back

 

[adembroski3]

Alright, thanks for the advice... much of it I have taken, at my local library and online.

Now move onto specifics... if you, as a player, were going into a campaign that you know is an Authurian campaign, what are you looking for?

I know there are many different theories on this, especially the tech aspect... do I allow full plate, or go with the realistic technological capabilities of the time, do I take the Legendary version (ie Arthur is a Roman officer, and Merlin's a druid) or the Fantasy version (Arthur's king of All Britain, and Merlin's a Wizard), or somewhere in between...

I much of what I'm asking I've already decided, and even written, but I'm looking for input. I did this once and wasn't happy with it, I want to be satisfied with my approach before going in this time.

 

[BASHMAN]

2 words

Two words:

Gurps Camelot. They have ideas for any kind of arthur you'd like to run: cinematic, high fantasy, to semi-historical arthurian stuff.

Most people don't buy gurps for the system, they buy it for teh resource material! (though I do like the system)

Note that Gurps is good for just about any setting you want background info on. Wanna run an arabian adventure? Gurps Arabian Nights. Ancient Rome? Gurps Imperial Rome. Etc. Very good source material, even if you don't use their system (much of it is just information, not actual game effects).

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Alright, thanks for the advice... much of it I have taken, at my local library and online.

Now move onto specifics... if you, as a player, were going into a campaign that you know is an Authurian campaign, what are you looking for?

I know there are many different theories on this, especially the tech aspect... do I allow full plate, or go with the realistic technological capabilities of the time, do I take the Legendary version (ie Arthur is a Roman officer, and Merlin's a druid) or the Fantasy version (Arthur's king of All Britain, and Merlin's a Wizard), or somewhere in between...

I much of what I'm asking I've already decided, and even written, but I'm looking for input. I did this once and wasn't happy with it, I want to be satisfied with my approach before going in this time.

As I player I have to say my style of character creation would favor the legendary flavored heavily by the fantastic.

IE: I'm a former Roman Officer but the Roman's happen to have developed some suspiciously plate-mail looking stuff and at higher levels I can pull off a few righteous magic tricks.

Similarly, we are fighting the Saxons, but they can summon demons and blood thirsters through their wicked pagan deities and we occansionally have weird run ins with the older than native fae and their less wicked pagan deities.

There is a fair amount of textual evidence for someone like Arthur, letters from Bishops and saint's lives and so forth, but without more it's very hard to tell where all the accumulated traits he has in the stories come from.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Alright, thanks for the advice... much of it I have taken, at my local library and online.

Now move onto specifics... if you, as a player, were going into a campaign that you know is an Authurian campaign, what are you looking for?

I know there are many different theories on this, especially the tech aspect... do I allow full plate, or go with the realistic technological capabilities of the time, do I take the Legendary version (ie Arthur is a Roman officer, and Merlin's a druid) or the Fantasy version (Arthur's king of All Britain, and Merlin's a Wizard), or somewhere in between...

I much of what I'm asking I've already decided, and even written, but I'm looking for input. I did this once and wasn't happy with it, I want to be satisfied with my approach before going in this time.

As I player I have to say my style of character creation would favor the legendary flavored heavily by the fantastic.

IE: I'm a former Roman Officer but the Roman's happen to have developed some suspiciously plate-mail looking stuff and at higher levels I can pull off a few righteous magic tricks.

Similarly, we are fighting the Saxons, but they can summon demons and blood thirsters through their wicked pagan deities and we occansionally have weird run ins with the older than native fae and their less wicked pagan deities.

There is a fair amount of textual evidence for someone like Arthur, letters from Bishops and saint's lives and so forth, but without more it's very hard to tell where all the accumulated traits he has in the stories come from.

I like the Merlin is the Celtic Church idea, but I'm fairly certain that Arthur is too early for that split to have really developed.

 

[King_Stannis]

I'd recommend reading TH White's "Once and Future King". It is a bit of a slog and not much fun, but it lists the major events in Arthur's reign from beginning to end. I have an index that I made for my Pendragon campaign.

 

[DM_Jeff]

I, Mordred

While folks have pointed out the good new books from Sword & Sorcery and RPGObjects, there's another resource, now that it's 75% off, that I can recommend.

I, Mordred: The Fall & Rise Of Camelot by Avalanche Press (the guys who voted themselves into the Origins awards making them useless).

It's an interesting take on things. Here's the blurb from their website:

In Ancient England, a tyrant king holds the land in the grip of fear. With the might of a magical sword and the threat of the return of a long-dead sorcerer, this fiend holds the noble, the good, and the true in his sway, squelching the will of the people and denying the claim of the rightful heir to the throne. The villain's name is Arthur.

Avalanche Press proudly invites you to return to a world you only think you know. I, MORDRED turns the legend of King Arthur upside down. Arthur is a mad dictator, clinging to power through the glory of ages past and the threat of his legendary Knights of the Round Table. His son, Mordred, is the rightful heir and struggles to amass an army in the name of justice to usurp his father's throne. And in the background, Arthur's wicked half-sister, Morgan le Fey, schemes to control England's ultimate destiny. This is a land crumbling in decay desperately in search of heroes.

Components: 64 pages, perfect bound.
Price: $5.99

-DM Jeff